Microsoft releases open source ChakraCore on GitHub

Microsoft has announced the release of the key components of the JavaScript engine that powers Microsoft Edge.

Back in December, the company declared its intention to share the source code for ChakraCore, which is now available under the MIT License at the ChakraCore GitHub repository. By making ChakraCore open source Microsoft has sent a signal of intent that it wishes to develop Chakra in the open.

The ChakraCore GitHub repository contains and provides developers with a fully supported and open-source JavaScript engine, which is the same as Microsoft Edge’s Chakra engine. This will enable third-party and independent developers to contribute to the Chakra engine in a similar fashion as the popular Mozilla Firefox browser. Microsoft will be hoping that the open source community of developers will assist in developing the product through contributions and input to ChakraCore.

In addition, Microsoft has also invited developers to help identify which other platforms they’d like to see ChakraCore supported on, or even by helping port it to the platform of their choice in order to support cross platform support.

To facilitate these goals Microsoft is publishing a roadmap for ChakraCore on the GitHub repository, which will aid developers in building ChakraCore on Windows 7 SP1 or above.

Microsoft claims that it is committed to bringing ChakraCore to other platforms, starting with Linux, and will keep the roadmap updated with details and status updates as progress is made in partnership with the open source community.